Margaret Kartomi Gallery of Musical Instruments and Artefacts

CURRENT EXHIBITION

The Place of Indian Music and Dance in Australia

This unique exhibition delves into the vibrant history of Indian music and dance in Australia through three pivotal moments of cultural exchange. It invites visitors on a journey through time and space, celebrating the artistic encounters that have enriched Australia’s cultural landscape.

Recordings

Excerpt #12 – Dholok (Manipur)
Lai Loukatba Ritual Music
A maibees (priestess) dances while calling upon a spirit. The dance may be seen near pools or rivers or on the way to a shrine. The choreography is interesting and the maibees are often fine dancers capable of great endurance. Usually, the dance is accompanied by pena (ancient bowed instrument) only. In this case, dholok drum and bells have been added.
Recorded by Louise Lightfoot in Manipur. Audio for MAMU exhibition taken from Ritual Music of Manipur (1960), Folkways Records FE4479, Ethnic Folkways Library.
Excerpt #13 – Edakka (Udukke) (Kerala)
Ayyappan Pattu
Adjoining the ancient rock temple of Thrikkur, devotees of the Lord Ayyappa have erected a temporary bamboo and banana stem temple to celebrate the departure of the local pilgrims to Sabarimala. Ayyappa is a very old Kerala deity, and Sabarimala, a remote hill temple in the south of Kerala, is dedicated to him. At a certain time of the year, people from villages in Kerala conduct a pilgrimage to this temple. The expression Ayyappan Pattu is used both for the departure ritual and for the singing of devotional songs dedicated to the life of Ayyappa.
On this pleasant cloud and moonless evening, five singers and edakka (small single-headed, hour-glass vessel drum held in the left hand and played with the fingers of the right hand) players gathered in front of the makeshift temple telling the life story of Ayyappa, while the pilgrims, clad in black clothes, sat behind them and enjoy themselves. As is customary, this ritual continued into the next morning when the temporary temple was torched and the pilgrims were sent off by the other villagers.
According to an ancient legend, Ayyappa was a son of the main Hindu Gods Shiva and Mohini, the female form of Vishnu. After the birth the divine couple left the baby at a river, where he was found by a local king who educated the child in his palace. Though the telling of the whole story of Ayyapan’s life lasts a while night, we have selected the part that describes the natural beauty surrounding the palace. The track is played in 6, 4, 8 and 16 beat cycles. The ballad is sung alternately by the main singer and the chorus.

The main singers and edakka players, Darsan and Ayyappan Nair, are supported by lay artists from the same village. Recorded at the Ayyappan Velakke temple festival in Thrikkur, Trichur district on 17 December 1995 by Rolf Killius. Audio for MAMU exhibition taken from Drumming and Chanting in God’s Own Country: The Temple Music of Kerala in South India, International Music Collection of the British Library Sound Archive.
Acknowledgements
Excerpt #1 – Sarasvatī Vīnā/Saraswati Veena
Karnatak instrumental tānam in raga hamsānandi
An instrumental improvisation performed by R. Subba Rao on the saraswati veena ‘plucked lute’, accompanied by tambūrā drone lute. In this tānam excerpt, the soloist creates a pulsating style of improvisation on the raga by repeating single notes and brief melodic patterns. Tānam is nowadays performed only with the rāgam-tānam-pallavi genre.
Recorded by Nazir Jairazbhoy in Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh, on 12 December 1963. Audio for MAMU Exhibition taken from The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music Volume 5: South Asia – The Indian Subcontinent, Routledge, 1999. Original audio from Karnatak Music from Vijayawada, Apsara Media compact disc, 1999.
Excerpt #3 – Sārangī/ Sarangi
Raga Chandrakauns
A sarangi solo performance by the late Pandit Ram Narayan with tabla accompaniment.
This recording has been digitised at the Music Archive of Monash University from a donation of tapes made by Vyankatesh Chandekar. The original source is a 1962 Vinyl (7", 45 RPM) – His Master's Voice (The Gramophone Company of India) – 7 EPE 1251. The tabla player is unidentified.
Recordings of the Gamelan Digul
Excerpt #2 – Violin
Karnatak vocal kriti, “Budham āśrayāmi” ‘Taking Refuge in Budha (Mercury)’ in raga nātakurañji, jhampā tāla
A vocal performance by the late M. D. Ramanathan, with T. N. Krishnan, violin, and Umayalpuram Sivaraman, mrdangam. This excerpt of a kriti from the Nine-Planet Cycle of Muttusvami DIksitar present the first line of the Pallavi section, followed by several sangati variations and the beginning of the anupallavi, in a ten-beat tala cycle.
Recorded by Fredric Lieberman and Amy Catlin in Adaiyar, Madras, 27 December 1977. Audio for MAMU Exhibition taken from The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music Volume 5: South Asia – The Indian Subcontinent, Routledge, 1999. Original audio from South Indian Classical Music House Concert, Apsara Media videocassette, 1994.
Excerpt #4 – Mrdangam
Karnatak tani āvartanam on mridangam barrel drum, in ādi tāla
The beginning of an extended drum solo in eight-beat ādi tāla performed by Karaikudi R. Mani, employing slow-tempo rhythmic figures and patterns. The excerpt ends with a more elaborate cadential design (kōrvai).
Audio for MAMU Exhibition taken from The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music Volume 5: South Asia – The Indian Subcontinent, Routledge, 1999. Originally recorded by David Nelson in Srinivasa Sastri Hall, Madras, on 28 February 1988.
Excerpt #7 – Bharatanatyam culture
Decknni dance song “Borieche Tari” /Borim boatman, Goa
The professional group Gavana performs this traditional Goan song about the devadāsī temple dancers of South India, arranged by T. A. Sequeira. The soloists are Margarida Távora e Costa and Silvano Fernandes; in the women’s dance, each dancer holds two burning candles as she imitates gestures of bharata nātyam classical dance.
Audio for MAMU Exhibition taken from The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music Volume 5: South Asia – The Indian Subcontinent, Routledge, 1999. Originally recorded by Susana Sardo. From Gavana Goa: A Viagem des Sons/The Journey of Sounds, Tradisom compact disc VS01, 1998, track 11.
Excerpt #9 – Bansuri
Raga Bhairavi: Thumri
A morning raga played in the Thumri style, which leans slightly towards folk music. Only the prologue of this raga features in the recording.
This recording has been digitised at the Music Archive of Monash University from a donation of tapes made by Vyankatesh Chandekar. The original source is Deben Bhattacharya’s 1962 collection (vinyl) Musique Traditionnelle De L'Inde (BAM – LD 014) first released in France. The recordings were made in 1954 in Benares. The musicians are unidentified.
Acknowledgements
Excerpt #5 – Pakhāvaj/ Pakhavaj (drum)
North Indian devotional song, “Subhaga varana tana” ‘Your beautiful colour’, of the Haridāsī sect
Responsorial devotional singing (samāj-gāyan) by the monks of the Haridāsi Vaishnav sect, with harmonium, jhāñjh ‘metal clappers’, and pakhavaj ‘barrel drum’ accompaniment. The song describes the beautiful face of Krishna.
Audio for MAMU Exhibition taken from The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music Volume 5: South Asia – The Indian Subcontinent, Routledge, 1999. Originally recorded by Guy Beck in Haridas Nagar, Vrindavan, in July 1992.
Excerpt #6 – Kathak dance syllables
North Indian kathak dance syllables
The dancer Archana Joglekar recites mnemonic syllables (bol) for the first two rhythmic compositions presented in a kathak dance recital: āmad ‘to arrive’ and uthān ‘to take off’. A tabla accompanist performs a slow tritāl of sixteen beats. A gap of one tala cycle separates the two rhythmic compositions; in the second half of this cycle a brief introductory syllable pattern leads into the faster and sharper uthān composition.
Audio for MAMU Exhibition taken from The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music Volume 5: South Asia – The Indian Subcontinent, Routledge, 1999. Originally recorded by Baba Santoshi at Radio Wani Studio, Bombay, 1995. Copyright 1995 by Archana Joglekar.
Acknowledgements
Excerpt #8 – Sitar
Raga Ahir Bhairav
This recording has been digitised at the Music Archive of Monash University from a donation of tapes made by Vyankatesh Chandekar. The original source is a 1967 vinyl entitled Music of India (Three Classical Rāgas) – His Master's Voice – ALPC 7.
Ravi Shankar – Sitar
Chatur Lal – Tabla
Pradjot Sen – Tambura
Excerpt #10 – Tabla
Teen Taal (16 Beats)
Chatur Lal demonstrates the 16-beat teen taal on tabla with Ram Narayan accompanying on sārangī.
This recording has been digitised at the Music Archive of Monash University from a donation of tapes made by Vyankatesh Chandekar. The original source is a 1961 album (vinyl) entitled The Drums of India (World Pacific Records – WP-1403).
Excerpt #11 – Sarod with Tabla
Ram Chander Suman – Tabla
Ashok Roy – Sarod
This recording has been digitised from a donation of tapes made to the Music Archive of Monash University by Ashok Roy in 1975.
The sarod is among the most popular and prominent stringed instruments played in Hindustani music, with sympathetic strings that give it a resonant, reverberant quality. A fretless instrument, it can produce the continuous glides/glissandi between notes known as meend. The lack of frets and the tension of the strings make it a very demanding instrument to play, partly because the strings must be pressed hard against the fingerboard.
The design of the instrument depends on the school (gharana) of playing. The conventional sarod is a 17 to 25-stringed lute-like instrument with four to five main strings for playing the melody, one or two drone (chikari) strings and nine to eleven sympathetic strings.
The sarod emerged in India during the early 19th century as an evolved form of the Afghani rubāb, commonly played in the regions inhabited by Afghan communities to the east of Delhi. In the latter half of the 19th century, the rubāb, musician and Afghan merchant Ghulam Bandagi Khan endowed the instrument with metal strings and a metallic plate, which are characteristic of the contemporary sarod. These improvements also facilitated longer-lasting notes and the intricate embellishments characteristic of dhrupad and khyal styles of music. Its subsequent history is complex and contested.
Acknowledgements

Location

Ground Floor Foyer,
Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music and Performance,
55 Scenic Boulevard,
Monash University, Clayton 3800

Opening hours

Monday to Friday, 9.00am – 5.00pm
For tour inquiries call 03 9905 5519

EVENTS IN 2026

Lecture notes - Indian Singing and Dance: Mental and Physical Health Benefits, 21 May 2026

ABOUT US

The Gallery is the public face of the Music Archive of Monash University (MAMU), which is hosted by the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music and Performance. Managed by a dedicated team of volunteers and housed in the Menzies Building/Building 11, MAMU contains some of the finest and rarest collections of the world’s sound and material arts.

Its collections and bequests focus mainly on the arts of Southeast and South Asia, the Asia-Pacific, Australia, Baghdadi and Ashkenazy Jewry, and Europe. The Gallery is named after Margaret Kartomi AM, FAHA, an ethnomusicologist who has published many books and articles on Indonesian and other music, and was employed in Monash University’s School of Music from 1969 to 2020, including as its Head throughout the 1990s.

Interview with Margaret Kartomi

PERMANENT DISPLAY

The Gamelan Digul

Browse this unparalleled ensemble of gamelan instruments built from any materials at hand by Indonesian anti-colonialists in the Boven Digul Dutch prison camp in 1927.

PAST EXHIBITION

Artistic Treasures from Sumatra and Java

Discover a selection of MAMU’s rare music recordings, musical instruments, theatrical puppets and masks, images, costumes, and textiles. Collected by Margaret and Hidris Kartomi, and Karen S. Kartomi Thomas on field trips in Sumatra and Java from the 1970s to the present time, the objects are explored further in a series of documentaries and audio-visual samples. Objects from other donors and researchers tell the story of how the collection was formed and its significance today.

Exhibition Catalogue

CONTACT US

Kerryn Morey: Kerryn.Morey@monash.edu 03 9905 5519
Margaret.Kartomi: Margaret.Kartomi@monash.edu
Bronia.Kornhauser: Bronia.Kornhauser@monash.edu

Margaret Kartomi Gallery of Musical Instruments and Artefacts

CURRENT EXHIBITION

The Place of Indian Music and Dance in Australia

Recordings

Acknowledgements

Recordings of the Gamelan Digul

Acknowledgements

Acknowledgements

Acknowledgements

Location

Opening hours

EVENTS IN 2026

ABOUT US

Interview with Margaret Kartomi

PERMANENT DISPLAY

The Gamelan Digul

PAST EXHIBITION

Artistic Treasures from Sumatra and Java

Exhibition Catalogue

CONTACT US